Well, to tell you the truth
by NegativeBlue
Summary: Emma tries to fix something...with magic. And it seems to be an universal truth that things rarely go to plan when Emma tries to fix things with magic. (SQWeek entry: Truth Serum)


_**A/N:**__ This is my entry for SQ-week: truth serum. It doesn't explicitly state it has to be a serum, so I had a little fun with it. Also this is slight cracky, and way more fluffier (I think?) than my usual writing, so don't get too attached to it, lol._

* * *

"Regina is going to kill me when she finds out." Emma mutters as she nudges the book laying on the floor with her foot, few of its pages now crumpled and bent out of shape. The glow which had startled her has faded from the letters and she kneels to pick the tome up. Her wary eyes find the purple cloud swirling above her, slowly dispersing in the air as she wonders what the hell she might have screwed up this time.

* * *

She returns from her trip to Regina's vault nearly an hour later. The books are back on the appropriate shelves. Or at least, she's fervently hopes they are and that the damage is not too apparent. And though she had been stopped once by an couple arguing loudly in the middle of the street about something, there hasn't been any purple monsters that she has been able to spot. In fact the town is looking perfectly normal for an typical uneventful weekday. It alleviates her worries about having unleashed all kinds of disasters on Storybrooke with her screw-up with the book.

Off course it also means her lie detecting power is still broken beyond repair. Moping, she fishes out some ingredients from the fridge, thinking she might as well start with dinner preparations early on. The door swings open wide, interrupting her thoughts and Henry zooms through it making her stop and turn to face him.

"You're home early…" Emma mutters. Her eyebrows raise upon noticing the apparent excitement on his face. "Something happened at school?"

Henry bobs his head, "everyone was sent home. The teachers were arguing in the hallway, and the classes got stopped because they couldn't sort out their differences."

"Seriously? That's the worst excuse I've ever heard. I know it's difficult adjusting but you can't keep skipping scho.."

"It's true!" Henry exclaims, his hands waving around in an agitated manner as he pleads with his eyes for her to believe him.

Narrowing her eyes to slits, Emma wishes not for the first time that she would be able to call upon her lie-detecting skills, as unreliable as it may have proven to be in the past. At least it had been better than nothing. Though she can't detect anything right now and for all intents and purposes it really did seem like he was telling the truth. But it also makes her wonder if the spell she had unwittingly cast earlier in the day has perhaps fixed her lie-detector ability after all.

She studies Henry for a moment longer and smirks as a thought springs to her mind. The vase that had gone mysteriously missing the day before, and of which Henry had claimed to know nothing about. It had seemed like he had spoken the truth at the time, but it can't hurt giving it another try at least.

"Say I believe you, what about the missing vase I asked you about yesterday?"

"I bumped against it and it broke. I picked up the pieces and dumped them in a trashcan down the street." Henry's eyes widen as he finishes speaking and one of his hands springs up over his mouth, as if he is horrified by admitting it out loud.

"Henry!" Emma shakes her head and rolls her eyes. "Now you decide to tell the truth all of a sudden? Why didn't you just tell me when I asked you the first time?"

"Because I broke that ugly blue lamp a week ago and you didn't even miss it and I thought that I could get away with it again, and I panicked when you asked me about the vase yesterday."

This time he covers his mouth with both of his hands, his cheeks turn red with embarrassment and Emma has no idea what to make of any of it.

"You broke a.." She pinches the bridge of her nose and leans back against the kitchen-counter. "Okay kid, is this some kind of game you are playing with me? You decide to just suddenly speak the truth from now on? Do you have some kind of bet going on with one of the kids at school or something?"

"I'm not playing a game. I just can't stop doing that, it happened at school too. I don't know what's wrong, I swear!"

"And I'm just supposed to believe that? Also that lamp was not ugly and I did miss something in the living-room." In fact she had been wracking her brain for a while to figure out what it was.

"You only say that because Grandma gave it to you as a housewarming gift, and I overheard you saying it was a horrible color for a lamp when you placed it on the table. Although it's not as bad as the pants you are wearing right now."

"Henry!" she scolds, even as she looks down at the dark blue plaid pants she is wearing. "And there's nothing wrong with these pants," she adds a tinge annoyed.

She watches as he puts his entire fist into his mouth this time, apparently in an effort to say nothing, though she still overhears him mumbling that the color doesn't match her t-shirt and wondering if grandma has gifted them to her as well.

It's enough to make her slowly count to ten before she sends miserable looking Henry off to his room until dinner-time. Though she won't admit to herself it is more an excuse so that she can figure out what is going by herself, rather than actually being mad at him making fun of her choice of attire.

Besides, she has the sneaking suspicion that whatever is going on with him might have something to do with her failed attempt at casting a spell. Swallowing, she decides to seek out her parents for some advice. She has one hand on the doorknob when she looks down at her pants and mutters under her breath how they are perfectly fine. But after a few seconds of staring at them, she growls out a few expletives and rushes towards her room to change.

* * *

"Uhm..mom? Dad? What's going on?" She asks after entering their apartment and finding them yelling at each other.

"He called me ugly," Mary Margaret cries out.

"No, no, Snow, I was just talking about your hat I swear!"

"But you always said all my hats are stunning and accentuate my beauty," Mary Margaret continues.

"They should all be put in a pile, doused with gasoline and set on fire," David exclaims vehemently, after which he slaps himself on the face and mutters a few curses. "I really did not mean to say that," he says, a frustrated expression on his face.

"Uhm..out of pure curiosity guys," Emma interrupts, after clearing her throat, "exactly how long has this been going on?"

"Since this morning I think," Mary Margaret says, "I was stumbling over something in the grocery store and the clerk asked if I was okay and I spent the next hour telling him about everything that has gone wrong in my life."

"I think we are cursed," David says after a moment of silence in which Emma tries to repress the urge to laugh at the image in her mind of the poor clerk at the grocery store. "Again," he adds. "You would think there would be some kind of protection in place against that, after the amount of times that has happened these past few years."

"Did you have another argument with Regina," Mary Margaret asks, while turning to face Emma.

"Oh come on... Why are you blaming me for this? I swear I have nothing to do with this. How did you find.." Stopping mid-sentence, Emma finally picks up on the mention of Regina and frowns. "What do you mean with that anyway."

"Because the last time you two had a go at it, she cast some kind of spell on you which made you walk backwards for an entire day. And before that she made you sing everything you said for nearly a week."

"I had almost forgotten about that incident, that was a horrible ordeal for everyone involved," David adds, "it was if someone was butchering a cat, repeatedly."

"Seriously?" Emma complains, as she places her hands on her side, "my singing is just fine, thank you very much."

"No, it isn't," both of her parents reply in perfect unison.

"Okay if you two are done mocking my singing capabilities, I'll go find Regina and see if we can get to the bottom of this." She leaves out the part where she might have, sort of, accidentally and by mistake, caused this apparent whole inability-to-lie thing herself.

"Sure Emma," Mary Margaret says, as she stares at the grey-brown hat in her hands, " and I guess I'll just return to this to the store."

"You really don't need to do that Snow. Just because I hate your hats, doesn't mean I find you ugly, you'll always be the most beautiful woman in all the worlds to me."

Closing her eyes, Emma makes a face as if she bit a lemon. "Guys, I'm still here, you know?"

"That's so sweet of you, Charming, and I suppose I can figure out a few ways in which you can make it up to me."

"Mom, dad?" Emma questions, as she flicks her eyes from one to another and wishes she could vanish, or just get swallowed by the ground. Or even both for that matter.

"Oh really?" David says, "and how can I make it up to you?"

"Okay, there is such a thing as _too _much truth, and I really don't need to be here to hear it. So I'm just..gonna go now, before I get traumatized for life," Emma mutters as she claps her hands across her ears and rushes towards the door.

* * *

She nearly runs into an agitated Regina coming out of the town-hall, surprised by the fact that the meeting she knew had been scheduled to last hours is apparently over already.

"Not much points on the agenda today?" Emma questions.

"It was more a case of short attention span on everyone involved," Regina replies darkly. Her eyes narrow as they follow two of the men coming out of the hall. They are looking at the two of them for a second, before they notice Regina glaring at them and immediately scurry off like animals with their tails tucked between their legs.

"Them?"

"I noticed Mr. Greenfield wasn't listening to anything I was saying, and I asked him what he was staring at. He replied with 'your boobs'."

Emma tries, but fails to hide her snort behind her hands. "Sorry, but come on you have to admit that's funny. Though I can understand why the meeting didn't continue after that."

"It did." Regina says, though she tightens her lips together after she does, "We came to the decision to postpone the meeting only after someone admitted to a mistake in the budget and I told the useless moron that he would be fired as soon as I could find a replacement in someone who graduated high school with basic knowledge of math."

Scratching at her forehead, Emma looks away from Regina's inquisitive eyes. "Uhm so..this has been going on since this morning, I assume?"

"Yes it has," Regina replies immediately. "It is almost as if everyone, including myself, is unable to tell a single lie."

"Yeah..about that…" Emma says in a careful tone as she unconsciously takes a few steps away from where Regina is standing. "I might just have an idea how that happened…"

"I should've known you were behind all this," Regina says with a tone bordering on furious. Without another word she grabs Emma by the wrist and drags her further into the hallway.

"Hey! Would you stop manhandling me!? I didn't do this on purpose you know? It was an accident. I didn't even intend to cast whatever the hell it was I cast in the first place, it just suddenly forced everyone to speak the truth." She winces at the glare Regina directs her way in response. "Well everyone except for me apparently," Emma adds, cringing.

"You!" Regina fulminates, "still do not understand the simple rule of not touching things."

"Look who's talking, you're the one dragging me through the damned hallway cavewoman-style. Would you please let go off me and just tell me how to undo this spell so shit can go back to normal?"

When there is no reply and Regina strengthens her hold on Emma's wrist, leading her on until they arrive at the door leading outside, Emma has enough. She yanks herself free with a few angry tugs and grasps the mistreated wrist with her other hand while glaring angrily at an unimpressed Regina standing in front of her.

"You know I just don't understand you lately. You've been so hot and cold to me these past few weeks. Every time I think I'm getting somewhere and work up the courage to ask you out on a date, you do a 180 on me and act like a complete bitch."

"You..want to ask me out on a date?" Regina says after a moment, sounding genuinely surprised by the fact.

"Yeah well.." Emma mumbles and shuffles her feet. She can feel her cheeks start to color and ducks her head and pushes the door open to exit the building. "It really does seem like I have a penchant for screwing up things, doesn't it?" She continues and walks towards the general direction of main street.

"I would blame it on the genes."

Emma smiles and turns to face Regina. "That reminds of how I figured out there was something seriously wrong. I stumbled upon my parents arguing. David had apparently told Mary Margaret that the hat she had bought was ugly. I guess it must really suck to not even be able to tell a simple white lie."

"Well for once I do agree with your father, dear, those hats are hideous, and your mother isn't exactly the epitome of haute couture. I suppose you get your own fashion mishaps from that side of the family."

"Henry _really_ is your son, isn't he?" Emma groans out in an exasperated tone while shaking her head and puffing her cheeks.

"Of course, just as he is yours," Regina answers and Emma wonders if the last part was due to the spell or if she was just being genuinely nice.

"Back to the topic of your magical mishap, what is it you did exactly?"

"I borrowed a few of the books you said I couldn't borrow and I think I might've accidentally cast a spell when I was trying to understand some passage about telling the truth." Emma scratches at her still warm cheek. "I pronounced the words out loud."

"You weren't supposed to read those books unsupervised, Miss Swan!" Regina scolds as places her hand on Emma's arm and stops her in her tracks.

"Sometimes I wonder if you are at all aware how much it turns me on when you call me Miss Swan."

"Of course I am aware." As soon as she finishes speaking, Regina lowers her head and covers it with her hands. "Would you please, stop doing that."

"No, this is actually kind of fun, getting the uncensored truth from you. And since we're on this topic, mind telling me, why you always leave half of your blouse unbuttoned whenever we have a discussion in your office or mine?"

"Because I enjoy seeing how flustered you get. I enjoy watching you attempting to restrain yourself from lowering your gaze. I enjoy how you wet your lips a thousand times when we talk and how you stutter all of your words as you try and pretend that you're not as affected as you are."

Emma's mouth sags more open the longer Regina continues, until she's pretty sure it has almost hit the pavement. "Holy crap, I know you have changed, but fuck me, you can still be really really evil when you want to be. No wonder I haven't been able to leverage an increase in the budget for the Sheriff-station these past few meetings. Seriously..."

"You..need to stop asking me questions," Regina says with a strained tone. Her eyes dart around to the people passing them by and finally settle on a couple having a heated discussion down the street. "And we need to sort out what spell you've cast, before this gets out of hand. Anymore than it already has."

"Oh come on, what's the harm? You act like this is something really dangerous and I just.."

Emma is interrupted by a loud crash and she turns just in time to see Grumpy flying through the window of Granny's and ending up on the ground a few paces away from where they are standing. The door swings open to reveal a seething Ruby, hands on her sides and her glowing eyes fixed on Grumpy who is rubbing his backside and slowly picking himself up.

"Okay I see your point," Emma continues. "And uhm..well, it was the brown book, with all the alchemy stuff on the front of it?"

She barely finishes speaking when she feels something take hold of her body and the next moment she is standing in Regina's vault. The bookcase from which she had _borrowed _the books is barely a few paces away and Emma cringes as she spies the book in question from which she had apparently cast the spell.

"This one?" Regina questions, while retrieving the book from the shelf. She frowns at the creases and the bent corners of various pages but to Emma's great relief, asides for a perfectly arched eyebrow, doesn't comment on it.

"Yeah.." Emma confirms sheepishly.

She stays quiet while Regina works to figure out a way to dispel the curse, though her thoughts keep returning to the things Regina admitted earlier. Just as her eyes keep trailing across Regina's form as she appears deep in thought. If it wasn't so clear that Regina is very uncomfortable with being forced to speak the truth, she would ask some more of the questions which burn on her tongue.

"You..are surprisingly quiet, please tell me you aren't thinking of more childish questions to ask?"

"You want to know the truth?" She grins at her own pun, though Regina giving her an unimpressed look, makes the corners of her mouth droop down again. "Well I'm not actually. This might sound strange to you, but I really have no interest in making you feel uncomfortable about admitting things you would rather keep a secret."

"I find it curious that for being the only person who can actually lie, you've been surprisingly truthful so far."

"Yeah well, I figured it was only fair if I tried to speak the truth as much as possible, since everyone else actually doesn't have the choice to do so."

That nets her a curious glance sideways, and she thinks she spies Regina's eyes softening for a moment, before they return back to scanning some of the pages in the brown spellbook.

"You should have just asked for my help."

"Right. As if you would've taken my complaint about my superpower suddenly not working anymore, seriously. I just..it sucks, it really sucks. Because at least when it came to you, I was always able to rely on it. Now that it no longer works, it makes picking apart those mixed signals you've been sending me lately an even harder task than before."

Regina's eyes settle on her for a long moment, but instead of saying anything, she makes a few gestures in the air with her hand. "I think that should do it. With some luck it might have even fixed your so-called superpower."

"Really?"

"No. It's likely just something that's between your ears, Emma."

"Great," Emma mutters sourly, "well I guess that also confirms the truth spell no longer works."

"Perhaps. Though I suppose we should double check that, to be on the safe side."

"Right. So I'm supposed to do what? Just ask you a few questions?"

"Indeed."

"How old are you?"

Regina snorts. "As if I would tell you."

"Damn. Well can I still test if my abilities work again?"

"Of course, dear."

"So uhh, about the blouse thing from before, does that mean you are attracted to me?"

Regina scoffs at that, an amused twinkle in her eyes as she tilts her head at Emma's way. "No," she answers and Emma hates how she can't detect whether it's the truth or not.

"Great," Emma huffs, "see, I'm pretty sure you are, which means my lie detector is still borked."

"Is it though?" Regina replies mysteriously, "I suppose you'll have to ask a few more questions to be absolutely sure, hm?"

She knows what the answer will be before she asks the question, but for some stupid reason she still decides to ask it anyway. "Might as well go for broke," she murmurs, though from Regina's raised eyebrow she's pretty sure she was overheard. "Would you go out on a date with me?"

"Yes."

"See," Emma growls out frustratingly, "if my powers had still been working I would've been able to detect that as a lie. Because after everything that happened today, there's no way in hell you would.."

"It wasn't."


End file.
